


Letting Him Panic, Even For Just A Few Seconds , Is A Few Seconds Too Long, Alright?

by This_ape_writes



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild cursing this time around, Tarsus IV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-05
Updated: 2016-12-05
Packaged: 2018-09-06 17:56:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8763121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/This_ape_writes/pseuds/This_ape_writes
Summary: Jim shares a little bit of his past with Spock as he waits for Leonard to wake up from being rescued.





	

He'd done very little else in the last two days than to stare at the wall of monitors above the head of the biobed and to occasionally sleep awkwardly hunched over it. 

This had resulted in his expert knowledge of blood pressure norms, oxygen saturation, and levels of consciousness as well as a neck that was really upset with him and an overall lack of sleep that was beginning to border on unhealthy. 

He knew he really wasn't going to do anyone much good at all if he collapsed from all of this but he figured he could keep going with awkward cat naps and meals brought to him for a few more days at least. 

He'd smell really awful by then but the rapid necessary bathroom breaks only a few steps away were all he could manage to let himself have right now. 

A shower was out of the fucking question. 

It would make it easier if *someone*decided just to wake the hell up again. 

"Come on Bones, please?" he whispered, out of desperation. 

Maybe asking politely would be all it would take. 

He hadn't tried that yet. 

But of course that doesn't do a damn bit of good and all the vitals stay level as the man in front of him slumbers on. 

So he'll stay a bit longer. 

He has to. 

The door to the private room slid open behind him and he could hear someone approaching where he is sitting in the dark but he didn't turn toward them as they moved closer. 

It wasn't anyone from medical, they weren't hesitant like this when they came barging in. 

So when he did finally look up at the person hovering over his shoulder he was pleasantly surprised to see his first officer, out of uniform, and pulling up a chair. 

He was probably coming here with the intention to coax him into going back to his quarters and getting some sleep like everyone else that come to see him had, but Jim was more than ready for that fight if it came down to it. Hell it was a fight he'd been winning for two days straight now. He was getting really damn good at it. So good in fact that he decided to take the first strike this time. 

"I'm not leaving so save your efforts," he muttered as he pushed himself forward and leaned more of his weight against the biobed in front of him. 

It was late and the lighting was piss poor at best and he is arguably sleep deprived but he would have sworn in an official on the record binding statement that his stoically solemn first officer twitched out a smile at that. 

"That was not at all my intention behind being here," he said and Jim felt his arms relax. 

"Good," he said giving him a genuine smile of his own. "Then by all means have a seat." 

He gave a nod and sat down in the chair he had been holding beside him and Jim turned his attention back to where it belonged. 

He traced his finger over the fingernails of the still hand resting against his own and wondered if that was something someone could feel while unconscious. He'd been unconscious enough in his life that he felt pretty sure the answer was no. But everyone was different. So he traced each finger all the way down to the last knuckle just in case. 

"His condition is stable." 

It's not a question. But Jim nods anyway. 

"Yeah. He's gonna be okay." That was the first time he'd said that out loud to anyone and it made a sharp pain he can't quite define burst into his chest and then roll into a dull ache. "He hasn't woken up but his color is better. And he's shifted into actual sleep now and not his induced coma." He glances over at his friend and grinned as he pointed at the wall. "I'm getting really good at reading all of these outputs."

Spock nodded at him and glanced at the readouts himself. 

"Knowing the treatment of past prisoners from this particular tribe, it is extremely lucky that his injuries were as minimal as they are. Especially when considering how long he was detained on the planet." 

"I know," Jim said as the feeling he associated with the early stages of a panic attack tried to claw their way into his nervous system. He forced it out and took a few long deep breaths. 

But Spock was absolutely right on this one. 

Tortured, starved, beaten, and assaulted are all terms that have been thrown around to describe what had happened here but all in all lucky is exactly what he'd been. 

It could have been so much worse. 

"Jim," Spock said quietly and it dragged his attention away as he turned to look as his friend. "I can understand the desire not to stay in your quarters in the event the doctor becomes conscious, but I do not understand your reluctance to sleep in the bed that has been provided for you in here." Jim glanced at the bed across the room that has remained empty and waiting for him to use for two days now and he shook his head just looking at it and let out a weary sigh. 

"I thought you weren't here for that," he said with a bit more anger than intended. 

"I am just concerned," Spock said and Jim understood it. I guess. 

The vague excuse he'd been delivering to explain that away is that he was too wound up to sleep and he couldn't risk being sedated and not being able I wake back up. 

Which is true.

Sort of. 

But that's not the whole story. 

And very few people should know what the whole story is. 

But if he could trust anyone with it, it would be Spock. So he huffed out a breath which wasn't quite a sigh and wasn't quite a laugh and he closed his eyes and swallowed. 

"I uh...I have a kind of a first hand...empathetic knowledge of the kinds of things he's been through these last few weeks Spock..." he said. But he knows that's too vague of a start to this story. 

He took a second to get the nerves he needed and latched both of his hands around Leonard's unmoving one before taking a steadying breath and continuing. "I was thirteen and I was uh..." he let out a breath that was a nervous kind of a laugh now and then turned to look his first office dead on. "I was one of the few survivors from what went down on Tarsus four," he explained. 

He watched as Spock frowned a little bit deeper and it was tiny and subtle but he could just make out that he was shaking his head back and forth in disbelief. 

"I...did...not know that. I am sorry, Jim." 

Jim hated that reaction but it was an understandable one. He ignored it and kept going. That's not quite the story he was wanting to tell. 

"You have to know that before that happened my mother and I had a rough relationship. That's kinda how I ended up there in the first place. I was a really good kid until I wasn't and when I flipped that switch I went full tilt, and I don't think she knew what to do with me. I don't blame her I mean I don't have any idea what I would have done in her place if I'd had to deal with me either," he chuckled. "But as soon as she heard what had happened to me she was on the first transport to the rescue ship before they'd even found any survivors."

Spock shifted a little bit closer to make sure he caught everything, and Jim could just barely keep going here with this but not if he kept looking at his friends' encouraging face he couldn't. So he dropped his vision to the woven standard issue hospital blanket that was spread across the biobed and poked two of his fingers in to the soft loose weave of fabric to distract himself as he kept going with his story. 

"I'd been on my own protecting several other kids for weeks by the time a rescue team arrived so I was a bit hesitant to accept that they were actually there to help us. Which is my nice way of saying the first rescuer who tried to touch one of my kids I may have violently attacked."

"That is an understandable reaction," Spock said. Jim nodded. 

"Yeah it was the guy's first rescue mission and he wasn't quite trained in what to do in that kind of a situation. He panicked and I wound up sedated and in restraints and dragged into a transport." Jim hears the sharp small intake of breath from his friend and nods. "My mom...god, my mom did not deal well with that either. She was waiting in the shuttle bay and saw them dragging me out and she didn't react too kindly to my rescuer either. Broke the guy's nose and knocked one of his teeth loose," Jim said. 

"Good," Spock added. "I am beginning to like your mother." That made Jim laugh a genuine chuckle and he took a deep breath before continuing. 

"But...here's why I'm telling you this. To spite physically assaulting a well meaning Starfleet officer and almost being detained for doing that, she flat out absolutely refused to leave me until I was fully conscious and knew where I was. And that took a few days to happen so she fought off quite a bit of well meaning people who tried to get her to leave me. And when I woke up for just a split second I was terrified that I was back in the wrong medical facility and that I was still..." but he loses the words he wanted to say so he doesn't. He shook his head and says something else. 

"The very first thing I saw when I woke up was my mothers face." Jim nodded his head and took a few moments so that he could keep talking. "And even though it had been several years since she and I had been ok with each other as soon as I saw she was there I knew *I* was going to be ok. That I was safe, if that makes sense?"

He sniffed loudly but didn't otherwise move as he pulled his eyes away from the blanket and up to Bones' relaxed if broken face. 

"When he wakes up he isn't gonna know where he is Spock. He's gonna think he's still back in that place. So yeah I could shower. I could eat in the cafeteria. I could walk over there to that bed and maybe even catch a few hours sleep. But then I might not be the very first thing he sees when he wakes up again. And letting him panic even for just a few seconds is a few seconds too long, alright?" He asked. 

He didn't really expect an answer. But he got one anyway as Spock reached over to rest a hand on his shoulder. 

"Alright, Jim," he said. "Alright."


End file.
